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2 thoughts on “In Defense of Closemindedness”

Hi Heretic! I appreciate that you liked my post enough to reblog it. Since I got an email from WordPress informing me of this, I decided to come check out this blog to see if if I liked it as well. Since it seems like we might disagree about a few key points, I’d like to alert you to them so you can decide if you still want to host my piece on your blog.

The points are:

1. I stand in full support of trans* liberation, and believe that trans women are just as much women as cis women are. In fact, trans women are in many ways subject to far more intense harrassment, violence, and abuse from patriarchy than are cis women.

2. I also stand in support of the struggles of sex workers of all genders around the world. I view the criminalization of sex work as a major source of violence against women, and believe that it is real work just as any other job.

With this in mind, you might read my piece in a different light. But perhaps not. Have a pleasant evening!

These points you are stating really have nothing to do with your post. They are specific political views that you hold, and it’s really disingenuous to see if you “like” someone reblogging your post (obviously if they reblogged it they liked it, and reblogging is one of the features of WordPress), but I’ll go ahead and address them anyway:

“1. I stand in full support of trans* liberation, and believe that trans women are just as much women as cis women are. In fact, trans women are in many ways subject to far more intense harrassment, violence, and abuse from patriarchy than are cis women.”

This is patently false. Females are oppressed based on their biological sex onto which is forced the feminine gender role. FGM, sexual slavery, forced pregnancy, compulsory heterosexuality, transactional sex, femicide, and marriage are just a few examples of this.
Trans women are biologically male, having been raised with male privilege and socialized as males. When harassed, they are usually harassed as gender-nonconforming males (since most don’t pass). Passing trans women, some of whom actually sympathize with female oppression, seem to understand that the harassment *they* experience is learning about how it feels to be harassed when read as a woman. While they are read as women (which for them is passing as adult human females) they understand “woman” is not simply an identity or a social construct based off gender tropes, but a physical, lived reality. There are also trans men (again, biologically females) who sympathize with females but for the fact that they grew up and were socialized as females. Both are radical feminist allies, who understand the value of female-only spaces. Those trans people who don’t sympathize often hurl gendered slurs and make violent threats towards radical feminists and other females, including lesbians who they see as “transphobic” for not wanting to take dick (just a refresher: lesbian = female homosexual, not homogenderual); they’re misogynists.

“2. I also stand in support of the struggles of sex workers of all genders around the world. I view the criminalization of sex work as a major source of violence against women, and believe that it is real work just as any other job.”

If you look through my blog, or especially my tumblr, you will see I have dozens of testimonies from exited women. Many sex workers support decriminalization, while few support legalization. These are not the same issues. Similarly, radical feminists support the Nordic model which decriminalizes the sex workers and criminalizes johns, to decrease sex trafficking and provide help for women wanting to exit the sex industry. As it stands in the sex industry, sex workers are predominantly women, while johns are men. It includes porn, which is notoriously unsafe and inherently exploitative as it is based on capitalism (putting profit over people). Even so-called feminist or queer porn sites like CrashPad Diaries have hired known rapists.